Animal Padre's
Christians Against All Animal Abuse "Christ’s redemption is for the whole of creation!"

NewslettersSummer 2005 Issue

Silkstone Village, Yorkshire, and Its Churchyard Memorial

This is a village near Barnsley and within the large churchyard there
is a monument – largely erected by public subscriptions from the poor
villagers! – in memory of their young children drowned in a terrible pit
disaster. The working conditions were appalling when, one day, a
cloudburst resulted in a flood of water rushing down in to the open
seams. The colliery owner and his family were regular worshippers at the
church. – indeed, there’s a private chapel built within the church, as
the gentry who worshipped in it were considered of a superior station in
life to the workers, and therefore were not to fraternise with them!
Yes, reflective of even the conditioned authoress of ‘All Things Bright
& Beautiful’, whose lesser-sung verse reads:

The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his
gate;
He made them rich or lowly and ordered their estate!

The disaster was given prominence throughout Britain and – most
tactfully! – it was agreed by the Incumbent (vicar or rector of the
parish) that an ‘appropriate inscription be placed on the impressive
memorial for all the drowned children; some who were hardly more than
infants. The wording was most tactfully agreed upon, and what stands out
today from the rest, for posterity to read, are the words to whom the
responsibility of the tragedy was subtly attributed: